The Complete Guide to Hunting and Trapping Basics Every Prepper Should Know

Why This Skill Is Non-Negotiable

When the grid goes down and supply chains collapse, your food storage will eventually run out. It doesn't matter how many freeze-dried meals you've stockpiled or how deep your pantry runs — finite resources have a hard ceiling. The preppers who survive long-term grid-down scenarios aren't the ones with the most cans. They're the ones who can walk into the woods and come back with protein.

Hunting and trapping are force multipliers. Traps work while you sleep. A well-placed snare line can feed a family without burning a single round of ammunition. But here's the brutal truth: if you've never set a trap or tracked an animal before the SHTF, you will fail at both — loudly, hungrily, and dangerously. These skills take time to build. Start now.

What You Need Before You Start

Don't touch a trap or pick up a rifle until you've squared away the fundamentals. Jumping in without preparation is how people get injured, waste resources, and spook every animal within a mile radius.

• Hunting License and Local Regulations: In a non-SHTF environment, know your state's game laws. Learn legal trap types, seasons, and bag limits. This also forces you to study local wildlife — what's actually out there to hunt.
• Core Gear: A reliable hunting rifle or shotgun appropriate for your region (a .308 Win or 12-gauge are versatile starting points), a quality fixed-blade knife like the Benchmade Saddle Mountain Skinner or a budget-friendly Mora Companion, field dressing gloves, and a game bag.
• Trapping Supplies: Conibear body-grip traps (110s for squirrels, 220s for raccoon and beaver), wire snares in 22-gauge or 24-gauge stainless steel, and stakes or anchors. Natural alternatives include cordage made from paracord, bank line, or braided plant fibers like dogbane.
• Navigation Tools: A topographic map of your hunting area and a baseplate compass. Know where water sources, game trails, and feeding zones are before you ever leave camp.
• Knowledge Base: Study animal tracking guides specific to your region. The Tom Brown Jr. Field Guide to Nature Observation and Tracking is a solid reference. Know your target species — their habits, diet, and movement patterns.

The Process — Step by Step

We'll break this into two parallel tracks: active hunting and passive trapping. A serious prepper runs both simultaneously.

1. Scout Before You Hunt: Spend time in the field without a weapon first. Identify game trails, scat, tracks, rubs, and feeding areas. Look for pinch points — natural funnels where terrain forces animals to move through a narrow corridor. These are your prime locations for both ambush hunting and trap placement.
2. Set Your Trap Line: Place snares and body-grip traps along active trails at ground level. For snares, position the loop 8–10 inches off the ground for rabbits, 10–12 inches for fox. Anchor firmly. Use natural materials — sticks, leaves, bark — to blend hardware into the environment. Check your trap line every 12–24 hours without exception. Leaving animals in traps longer is inhumane, wastes protein, and attracts predators to your line.
3. Still Hunting: Move slowly — 10 steps, stop, observe for 2–3 minutes, repeat. Wind is everything. Always move into the wind so your scent carries away from your quarry. Wear clothing that minimizes noise; wool is a natural, quiet alternative to synthetic materials.
4. Shot Placement: Know your anatomy. For deer, aim for the heart-lung area — just behind the front shoulder, one-third up the body. For small game, head shots preserve the most meat. Never take a shot you're not confident in. A wounded animal that escapes is wasted protein and poor stewardship.
5. Field Dress Immediately: Remove internal organs within 30 minutes of the kill to prevent meat spoilage. Make a shallow incision from sternum to pelvis, avoid puncturing the stomach or intestines, and remove organs cleanly. Hang the carcass to cool in a shaded, ventilated area.
6. Process and Preserve: Butcher into workable cuts. Without refrigeration, use salt curing, smoking, or jerky methods to extend shelf life. A simple DIY smokehouse from cinder blocks and sheet metal can process significant quantities of meat.

Tips From the Field

• Pressure kills productivity. If you've been hunting or trapping an area hard, rotate locations every 3–5 days. Pressured animals pattern differently and avoid disturbance zones quickly.
• Small game sustains. Don't overlook rabbits, squirrels, and birds. Snaring rabbits along a 10-trap line can produce consistent daily protein with minimal effort. Rabbits alone won't give you enough fat long-term — combine with other food sources.
• Scent control matters more than camouflage. Human odor spooks game at 200+ yards. Store hunting clothes in sealed bags with local soil or pine needles. Baking soda applied to the body reduces odor naturally.
• Improvised traps work. A deadfall trap — the classic figure-4 or Promontory Peg design — can be built in 20 minutes from sticks found on the ground. Practice building these now so muscle memory kicks in when it counts.
• Bait strategically: Peanut butter is a near-universal attractant for small mammals. Acorns, corn, and apples draw deer. Fish-based baits attract raccoon, fox, and coyote.

What to Practice Now — Your 30-Day Plan

• Week 1: Purchase or borrow a basic trap kit. Set three snares in your backyard or a legal practice area. Learn to identify at least five animal tracks common to your region using a field guide.
• Week 2: Take a half-day to scout a local hunting area on foot. Map game trails, water sources, and feeding zones. Practice still hunting movement — slow, deliberate, wind-aware — even without a target animal.
• Week 3: Build two improvised deadfall traps from scratch using only natural materials. Use a YouTube tutorial for the figure-4 deadfall, then do it again without the video. Repeat until it's automatic.
• Week 4: If hunting season is open, execute a morning hunt. If not, attend a field dressing class or practice on store-bought whole poultry. Process the animal completely — don't stop at the kill. Learn the full chain from field to table.

Preparation Is a Lifestyle, Not a One-Time Event

You don't learn to hunt and trap by reading about it. You learn by doing it — in cold weather, in rain, when you're tired and the animals aren't cooperating. Every hour you spend in the field now is an investment in your family's survival later. The skills you build today are the ones that will feed you when everything else fails. Get out there, get your hands dirty, and build the kind of competence that no supply chain disruption can take away from you.